


a stitch away from making it

by QueenWithABeeThrone



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Avengers: Endgame (2019) Spoilers, M/M, Role Reversal, Time Travel, Timeline Hopping, steve got dusted and bucky didn’t
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-27
Updated: 2019-04-27
Packaged: 2020-02-07 06:37:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18615154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenWithABeeThrone/pseuds/QueenWithABeeThrone
Summary: The doppelgänger pivots, grabs his arm, and moves with him, spinning him around to throw him away. “Jesus fucking—hey, punk, for fuck’s sake will you just let me explain?”“I don’t need an explanation,” Steve spits, “Loki.”or: Steve fights someone who looks a lot like him, and gets the shock of his life.ENDGAME SPOILERS.





	a stitch away from making it

**Author's Note:**

> title is from Fall Out Boy’s “The (After) Life of the Party”.
> 
>  **ENDGAME SPOILERS.** this takes place in an AU where Steve gets dusted while Bucky doesn’t, which means Bucky’s the one who goes time-heistin’. this happened.

“Ah, hell,” is the first thing out of the doppelgänger’s mouth when Steve sees him, carrying the scepter and looking caught out.

Steve’s jaw goes tight. _Loki_ , he knows right away—he’d gotten a message from downstairs that Loki had gotten away with the Tesseract somehow. This must be him, trying to make it two for two.

“Okay, this looks bad, but I can explain,” Loki starts.

“Save it,” says Steve, and he flings his shield.

To his shock, the doppelgänger flings a second shield at him. The shields collide in mid-air, and the noise is almost deafening, but Steve shakes it off fast and charges forward, throwing a punch at his lookalike’s face.

The doppelgänger pivots, grabs his arm, and moves with him, spinning him around to throw him away. “Jesus _fucking_ —hey, punk, for fuck’s sake will you just let me _explain_?”

“I don’t need an explanation,” Steve spits, “ _Loki_.”

“You think I’m _Loki_ ,” says the doppelgänger, sounding flabbergasted. He ducks to the side when Steve swings another punch and says, “Steve, if I were Thor’s brother I’d be trying to stab you right about now. I don’t wanna hurt you. I _know_ you.”

“No, you _don’t_ ,” Steve snaps, and ducks low to sweep the doppelgänger’s legs out from under him. The lookalike goes down hard with a curse, but rolls out of the way before Steve can knock him out—his reflexes are _fast_ , faster than anything.

“I’d be a real shitty friend if I didn’t,” snaps the lookalike, getting to his feet and blocking Steve’s next punch with his left, wincing when he does, “after making you eat chicken soup and rice in the middle of winter. _Your_ mom’s recipe, by the way, because my mom’s chicken soup tasted like feet.”

Steve blinks. What—

“Oh, you can read minds now?” he snaps.

“For fuck’s sake,” says the doppelgänger, and he reaches a hand up to the side of his neck, presses two fingers down. Steve watches his face, familiar and just that slightest bit _off_ , glitch and fade away into—

—into Bucky’s face.

“Bucky?” Steve whispers, his hand drawing back, nerveless.

Bucky smiles, warmly. His eyes, though, are wet and shining with tears. “Hey, Steve,” he says, his voice a shaky thing. “I’ve had a real shitty few years. Can we talk?”

\--

“Time travel,” says Steve, flatly. He and Bucky have—pretty much flown the coop, actually, run off to a fire escape somewhere near Stark Tower where they can have a tiny bit of privacy, and for the past few minutes he’s been an enthralled, horrified audience to Bucky’s story. “You’re here because of _time travel_.”

“Yeah,” says Bucky, fiddling with the second shield’s straps. It’s almost identical to the shield Steve carries, at a glance, but now that Steve’s looking he can see all the tiny differences, the nicks and scratches in the paint. Now that Steve’s looking he can see the stubble on Bucky’s face, the shadows in his eyes, the grief etched into every line on his face. “It’s bad, Steve. Half the world went to dust five years ago, and you with it. When Scott turned up at the front door with his plan, I just—couldn’t turn it down. I missed you too much.”

“I miss you too,” says Steve. “Where—You’re here, in America, right now?”

“No, I was,” says Bucky, then he pauses and starts counting on his fingers before he says, “I was in India, poisoning a minister ‘round this time.” He hunches in on himself and looks away, letting out a slow breath. “I’ve had a shit day, Steve. I had to tell an elevator full of HYDRA that I was on their side so I could get this fancy-ass scepter, and the whole time I was there I felt like they were gonna _know_. And then— _you_.”

His voice breaks.

God. God fucking dammit. Steve wants to slam a fist into the Red Skull’s smug face again, just for that, just for what his organization did to Bucky. “I’m here,” he says, resting a hand on Bucky’s shoulder. It’s strange, seeing him wearing the stars and stripes, but somehow—right, too. “I’m here right now. I’m not gonna leave you.”

“But I will,” says Bucky. “I’m gonna have to, now that I got the scepter. The fact that I’m here, that I told you at all—it means I changed your timeline. It means you’re not _my_ Steve, and your Bucky’s in India under HYDRA’s control.” He looks up at Steve, and runs his teeth over his lower lip. “I can’t stay, Steve,” he says. “I wish I could.”

“You’re still Bucky,” says Steve, “and I mean it, I’m not gonna leave you.”

“Oh, hell, I left the stupid with you after all,” says Bucky. Then he pauses, and lets out a wet, tired laugh. “And I probably made it even easier for you to find him,” he says. “I got you an in. Sitwell and Rumlow, they’re HYDRA—track them down, and tell them you want the Asset. Don’t let them know you know it’s me, they’ll think it’s ironic as fuck, what you’re asking.”

Sitwell and Rumlow? Steve’s throat goes tight. He’d liked Sitwell. “Oh,” he says. “Does Fury know?”

“Nope,” says Bucky. “They’re good at covering their tracks, but—listen, Fury’s a hard fella but he ain’t bad. Ask him about his cat sometime.”

“Fury’s got a _cat_?” Steve asks, flabbergasted. “How—”

“His buddy Carol’s a coworker,” says Bucky. Something beeps on his person, and he sighs. “That’s Tony. _My_ Tony. He and Lang are wondering where I got to, I bet.” He stands up, clambers onto the railing. “I gotta go,” he says.

“Hey, hey, wait up a sec,” says Steve, catching him by the wrist. Bucky stops, turns his head, and he’s so much older, so much more _tired_ than he had been before the train. “I’m gonna find you,” he says. “I’m gonna get you out.”

“I’m counting on that,” says Bucky, “but—don’t do anything stupid, okay?” _Until I get back,_ he doesn’t say, because there is no getting back. Steve knows that.

“How can I?” Steve says. “You’re taking all the stupid with you.”

Bucky smiles, soft and sad. He leans down to—to press his lips to Steve’s, kiss him soft and chaste, like it’s the ‘40s again and they’re just boys joking about practicing kissing girls on each other. The old butterflies swarm upwards into Steve’s throat, and he shuts his eyes.

Then Bucky breaks away. “Line splits here,” he says, soft, rough. “Good luck.”

And he jumps off the railing.

\--

The next time Steve sees Bucky again, he’s in Steve’s apartment with Loki’s scepter, just hours after the mop-up’s done. Tony’s going to be fine after that small heart attack, and Steve has very quietly passed some information on to Fury about the reliability of his agents. It’s not getting _his_ Bucky back just yet, but it’s a start.

He flicks the kitchen lights on, and—blinks.

“Didn’t Ma say never to drink milk straight out of the carton?” he says to Bucky, who grins at him and keeps chugging anyway. “What—What are you doing here, Buck? I thought you had to leave.”

“I did, and I still do,” says Bucky. He’s—lighter now, somehow, his eyes brighter and less pained, although there are new shadows behind it. Something’s changed, he realizes. “We won. We got everyone back. We—There are still people we lost, but everyone’s back. _You’re_ back.” He runs a hand through his hair. “You’re waiting for me right now, ‘cause I told you that I love you.”

“So why come here?” Steve asks, taking a seat next to him. “I’m not your Steve.”

“And I’m not your Bucky,” says Bucky. “Who’s—gonna be rough to live with when you pull him away from HYDRA, sure as hell won’t lie about that. But he’ll do it with you.” He tosses the carton right into the trash, and pushes the scepter right across the counter towards him. “I just came to return this,” he says. “Make sure this timeline doesn’t go to hell in a handbasket. Sorry we kinda screwed it up, by the way.”

“Yeah, thanks for returning that,” Steve huffs, propping his chin up onto the heel of his hand and looking Bucky over. He’s cut his hair now, and his smile is easier. The shield is nowhere to be found. “And—you gave me hope. That’s not screwing it up, Buck. That’s fixing it.”

Bucky smiles, and says, “Leave it to you to see the bright side, huh?” He stands up, moves around to frame Steve’s face with his hands, one cold metal and the other warm flesh. He presses a kiss to Steve’s forehead, and says, “It’s up to you now. After this, I’m going home and staying there.”

“Got any advice?” Steve asks.

“Yeah,” says Bucky, letting go and stepping away, leaving the scepter on the table. “The Avengers—they’re gonna be invaluable. Let them in.” He pauses, then adds, “And there’s a guy in Washington, DC, working at the VA, who you’re gonna get along with like a house on fire. Ask for Sam Wilson, and tell him you want a jogging buddy.”

“Anything else?” Steve asks.

“Yeah,” says Bucky, unlatching the window and looking back at Steve, one last time. “He loves you. He’ll always love you. Just give him time, he’ll always come back to you.”

Steve doesn’t ask who he’s talking about. He already knows—there’s a file in his bag he’s conned from Rumlow and copied over for Fury to look at. He nods, instead, and says, “He loves you too. Has since you were kids, he just never could spit it out.”

“He did,” says Bucky. “You’ll find me. I might be a ghost story, but I know you. You’ll always find me.” He smiles once more. “Bye, punk,” he says, one last time.

“You too, jerk,” says Steve, and watches Bucky vault out the window and into the night.


End file.
